WMD explanation of the week: they were looted. Sure, several hundred tons of neurotoxins were looted. So effectively and so secretively that we haven’t found even a single looter. Sounds likely. But OK, let’s grant ‘em that one. Let’s also admit that US forces have had no luck finding the “looted” WMD. Isn’t the solution obvious? Bring back Blix’s team; they’re professionals. Let them get back to work. After all, the IAEA found looted uranium a whole lot quicker than we could.

MSNBC scores the first review of Warren Zevon’s upcoming album. Eric Olsen says it’s a masterpiece. And the review made me sniffle.

BookSense allows you to order books online and pick them up at your local independent bookseller. Unfortunately, it’s dog slow, and I’m a bit perturbed by their offer to sell me a book named simply Harry Potter — seems to me that there aren’t enough words in that title. Also it would be better if they did not direct me to a bookstore in Canton when I live in Somerville.

I mentioned Paul Krugman’s piece on liquidity traps last month — I’d link to it again, but the NYT doesn’t have free archives. Pity. However, thanks to MetaFilter, I can show you this paper (original) (PDF) from the Dallas Federal Reserve. It’s a nice clean explanation of liquidity traps along with some speculation about ways to fend off the one we’re about to hit.

WISH 52 (original) asks what Robin Laws classification fits you best. I’m Iron Man! Um. Robin Laws identifies several types of gamer in his book of GM tips: The Power Gamer, the Butt-Kicker, the Tactician, the Specialist (plays one type only), the Method Actor, the Storyteller (plot and pacing fan), and the Casual Gamer. Which of these types do you think you are, and why? Most people aren’t pure types, so multiple choices are OK. ...

Mamet does 2001, via Amygdala.

The Game Boy Advance SP is the best computer gaming device I’ve bought in two years and it’s a close second to my Windows PC as the best gaming device I’ve ever bought. It blows my Playstation and Playstation 2 away. Man, what a cool little device. I had an old Game Boy Color, and it was OK, but it did not have the superslick form factor of the Advance SP. This thing is small enough to carry around comfortably in one hand. Plus it’s got a backlit screen. Plus the CPU is powerful enough to do interesting games. ...

David Neiwert just published the final installment of the “Rush, Newspeak, and Fascism” series. Sorry about the self-link; he doesn’t have a table of contents anywhere. But he says there’s a PDF coming soon. Anyhow, this installment is fascinating material on the connection between religion and fascism, made all the more important and relevant by the recent Rudolph arrest. And, yes, it’s interesting when considering Islamic terrorism as well. Key coinage: “fascimentalism.”

It’s not time to vote yet. Maybe soon. Who knows? It’s a pretty tricky issue. The problem is that if elections are held now, you’re going to get either Islamic extremists or Baathist remnants in power. In many ways, Jay Bremer is right. The long-term goal of a democratic country would be poorly served by holding elections right this minute. This is not, however, news. Most anti-war people noted this problem many months ago. The problem is not that Bremer is putting off elections, it’s that he doesn’t have any clear plan on how to get to them — as predicted. Unfortunately, saying “So what will we do when we win?” was apparently a sign of anti-Americanism. ...

I just removed my RSS .91 feed, which should discommode almost nobody — I got about 15 hits on that feed over the last week, most of which were from Web crawlers. Conversely, I got seven hundred or so hits on my RSS 2.0 feed. Thus, I’m not too worried about discommoding people, and I’ll point index.xml at index.rdf just in case. Administrivia done; read on if you care about why I’m making the change. (Hey, he rants about things other than politics.) ...